Yearly Archives: 2014

Another FamilyTree DNA sale starting right now, and ending in a few days. I think this is the first time the Big Y test has gone on sale since it was originally launched. The Y67->Y111 upgrade is also on sale, something not always the case.

Standard Tests

Regular Price

Sale Price

Y-37

$169

$129

Y-67

$268

$199

Y-111

$367

$279

Big Y

$595

$495

Upgrades

Regular Price

Sale Price

Y-12 -> Y-37

$99

$70

Y-12 -> Y-67

$189

$148

Y-12 -> Y-111

$339

$239

Y-25 -> Y-37

$49

$35

Y-25 -> Y-67

$148

$114

Y-25 -> Y-111

$249

$209

Y-37 -> Y-67

$99

$79

Y-37 -> Y-111

$220

$179

Y-67 -> Y-111

$129

$109

If you’re looking to get started in genetic genealogy, or were waiting for a sale to upgrade an existing test, now is a good time to order a test.

Recently I came across an interesting web site, called Mapire, which displays historical maps of the Hapsburg Empire. The maps currently correspond to three military surveys carried out in the time periods 1763-1787, 1806-1869, and 1869-1887. These periods cover different geopolitical periods, when the areas under control were variously called the Hapsburg Empire, the Austrian Empire, the Austro-Hungarian Empire. The military maps were created at a scale of 1:28,800. What’s really neat about the maps on Mapire, is that they are all synced to current digital maps, so when you zoom in on one of the military maps, it shows on the left side of the window, while the current digital map is shown on the right. An example, for the town of Kańczuga:

Map of Kańczuga from the Second Military Survey (1806-1869)

Cadastral Maps, another kind of state-created map, were created at a scale of 1:2,880, or ten times the resolution. This site does not yet have Cadastral Maps, although some Cadastral Maps for the Galicia region can be found in the Gesher Galicia Map Room.

One of my earliest posts on this blog was about Find A Grave and how it could be used to help you with your genealogy research.

It’s long bothered me that they had no mobile app that could be used on my cell phone. Certain since BillionGraves launched back in 2011, the lack of a mobile app has been glaring.

Last year Ancestry.com purchased FindAGrave, and people have been wondering what was going to happen to the service. The first big change luckily is a good one, the launch of a mobile app!

The app is focused on searching for cemeteries and graves. It doesn’t yet have any way to manage the memorials you’ve created on FindAGrave.com, or Virtual Cemeteries. One very important feature it has integrated, however, is finding nearby graves that people have requested photos of, allowing you to submit photos through the app.

One thing you might notice in the screenshot above is that it allows you to ‘Add GPS’ to a grave. While Find A Grave has never death with GPS before, it seems they are now moving in BillionGraves’ direction by supporting, at least in a small way, GPS coding of graves.

Do you use Find A Grave? Do you use BillionGraves? Are you planning on downloading this app? Have you already? Share your thoughts on grave-focused sites and apps in the comments below.